


A Reminder

by Goodluckdetective (scorpiontales)



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: F/M, Light Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-24
Updated: 2015-10-24
Packaged: 2018-04-27 23:06:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5068348
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scorpiontales/pseuds/Goodluckdetective
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Where the favor came from.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Reminder

There is a 50% chance that Hawke will not survive the night.

It is what the mage says to Fenris when Fenris corners him at last, asks him to give answers besides “maybe” and “I don’t know.” He waits until the mage has left Marian’s room to interrogate him, in order to cause the injured woman no extra distress. It takes an emotional honesty Fenris didn’t know he possessed to get Anders to tell him the truth, words that lack a bitter edge when he speaks. 

“Please,” is what Fenris says. “I need to know.”

The mage has no reason to tell him the truth. While they are not enemies anymore, they are still not friends, and as a result, Anders owes him nothing. But he tells Fenris anyway.

“The wound is healed…but the infection. It all comes down to if she can pull through the fever.” 

“And the chances of that?”

There is a long pause before Anders speaks again.

“It could go either way. If it was anyone else, I’d say it’d be unlikely they’d pull through, but well…” Anders gives him a smile that is all sympathy, and Fenris hates him for it a little, hates him for knowing what this situation is doing to him. “It’s Hawke. She’s been up against almost everything.”

That is true, but Hawke has never been impaled by a sword her size before. Hawke has never almost bleed out in a duel. Hawke has never stood for a mere second after beating the Arishok to smile at them all before collapsing in a pile of her own blood. 

He takes watch, like everyone else. They all take shifts, only leaving when they have to. There is only fifteen minutes where Fenris is with Hawke alone. It is the only time he speaks all night.

“I am sorry,” Fenris says, bowing his head. He has pulled up a chair next to her bed and it creaks as he shifts in it. Hawke’s hand lies next to her side, and twitches slightly from the fever, but Fenris can’t bring himself to grab it. He doesn’t deserve to, after what he’s done. After he left. “I should have not let you participate in that duel.”

He knows what Hawke would say to that: “ _what other choice did I have, Fenris?”_ He can picture the exact inflection she’d say that sentence in, her can almost imagine the worn smile on her face if she were to spoke those words. It’s torture. 

He considers speaking more, when his eyes catch a flash of red on Hawke’s dresser. One of her handkerchiefs. She has a dozen, all the same shade of red, and no matter what they are doing, there is always one on her person. She never wears it quite the same, sometimes around her neck, sometimes to cover her hair, sometimes around her arm as a band. It’s the reason he’s started to associate her with the color.

He reaches for one. It’s a little worn, the edges frayed, and he remembers how she offered him one just like this that night that both seems so long ago and so near. 

_“My father always said it was important to carry memories with you. To make memories physical. And this memory…well it’s a good one. So, if you want, well, it’s not like I don’t have plenty. And the color suits you. Think of it as a favor. My favor for you.”_

She’d tied it around his wrist then. When he’d left, he left the piece of fabric with her. Rejected the offer. The memory. Then, it had seemed like a good choice. The right choice.

Now it just felt empty. 

He folds the handkerchief in half so it looks like a band. Before he even thinks about it, he’s tying it around his wrist, using his teeth to secure the knot. It looks right on his wrist, that flash of red. Hawke was right; the color suits him. 

He sits there for five more minutes before Varric comes in. He looks as tired as the rest of them, and he walks over to Hawke’s bed to feel her forehead. From his frown, the fever lingers. When he turns to Fenris, his eyes go right to his wrist.

“Why you wearing that, Broody?”

The nickname lacks it’s usual spark. Fenris reaches for the edge of the cloth and tangles his fingers in it. He doesn’t look at Varric when he speaks.

“Just a reminder.”

He hopes that one day, it will be more comforting to see than painful.


End file.
